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GSSA
The 1820 Settler Correspondence
 as preserved in the National Archives, Kew
 and edited by Sue Mackay

Additonal Information

This is pre 1820 information mainly taken from actual images of UK parish registers and other primary sources which I have personally researched. Further information about the settlers and their families once they reached the Cape can be found at https://www.1820settlers.com/

Sue Mackay

RIDGARD, Ezra - Extra Data

Written by Sue Mackay on .

 

(member of PRINGLE's Party)

 

"The Scottish Settler Party of 1820" by J.V.L. RENNIE says that Ezra was born on 10 June 1790 in Holywell, Flintshire, Wales. Another Ezra RIDGARD, a bookseller and stationer in Sheffield, left a will (1817) in which he bequeathed "to my nephew George RIDGARD, son of my brother Benjamin RIDGARD, the sum of six hundred pounds, to Ezra RIDGARD, son of my late nephew Benjamin RIDGARD, the sum of four hundred and fifty pounds, to my late apprentice William ELLIOTT, son of Samuel ELLIOTT, my late Brother-in-Law, the sum of four hundred pounds, and to Hannah PARKER, widow of my late Brother-in-Law Ebenezer PARKER, the sum of one hundred pounds"

[The William ELLIOTT mentioned in the will was also a member of PRINGLE's Party]

 

Welsh Archive Service

 

There is a baptism on 14 August 1790 in Holywell, Flintshire for Ezra, son of Benjamin and Ann RICHARDS. The clerk may have misheard the name as a common Welsh surname.

 

London Metropolitan Archives:

 

Ezra RIDGARD married Elizabeth KEEN, spinster, on 26 December 1815 in St.Marylebone.

Both signed their names.

Witnesses: William BARNES and Sam'l RIDGARD

 

Mary Ann, daughter of Ezra and Elizabeth RIDGARD, mechanic, baptised 6 April 1819 in St.Marylebone (born 18 March)

 

National Archives, Kew, London

 

RG8/60 (Records of the British Lying-in Hospital, Endell Street, St.Giles in the Fields)

Elizabeth RIDGARD, wife of Ezra, saddler, admitted 13 September 1816, aged 20, Settlement: Stainton, Pembrokeshire; Reckoning: end October; Came in 10 November; Delivered 11 November, boy; Child baptised 21 November (Andrew); Discharged 1 December; Recommended by Susannah BARTON.

RG8/65 (Baptisms of the British Lying-in Hospital, Endell Street, St.Giles in the Fields)

Andrew, son of Ezra and Elizabeth RIDGARD, 96 East Street, Manchester Square, saddler, baptised 21 November 1816

 

Despite the above statement that Elizabeth KEEN was from Pembrokeshire, her Death Notice (Cape Archives) says that she was born in London on 13 May 1796 (also consistent with date of birth on gravestone)

 

London Metropolitan Archives

 

Eliz'th KEEN of Thos. and Mary baptised 29th May 1796 (born 13 May) in St.Marylebone

 

Sheffield City Council Libraries, Archives and Information Services

 

Ezra RIDGARD married Ann PARKER by licence on 22 January 1772 in St.Peter and St.Paul, Sheffield, Yorkshire  [this is the great uncle Ezra who left the will]

Both signed

Witnesses: Wm PARKER and Thos. PARKER 

 

Yorkshire, Archbishop Of York Marriage Licences Index, 1613-1839

 

Marriage licence says Ezra RIDGARD was aged 27, hence born c1745, and Ann PARKER was 21

 

Derbyshire Record Office

 

Benjamin, son of Benjamin and Anne RIDIARD baptised 27 March 1754 in St.John the Baptist with St.Ann, Buxton, Derbyshire

 

Benjamin RIDGARD and Ann BIRCH, both of the Chapelry of Buat in this parish, were married by Licence on 29 May 1776 in All Saints Bakewell, Derbyshire

Both signed

Witnesses: Francis RIDGARD and John [WI....]

 

 

 

 

 

 

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